Industry News

March 2, 2015: The February 2015 edition of the “CMO Survey,” published by Duke University, shows that CMOs plan to spend an average of 13.5 percent of their budget on social media marketing over the next 12 months, a percentage that’s expected to increase to 22.4 percent within the next five years.

At the moment, B2B product marketers spend 9.3 percent of their budget on social media, while B2B service marketers invest 9.6 percent of it on the same efforts. That being said, B2B CMOs see these percentages rising to approximately 12.6 percent and 14.3 percent respectively over the next 12 months. ... Read the full post

February 26, 2015:A new report released by SAP shows that B2B buyers are becoming more informed, with about 75 percent of them saying they research products, solutions and vendors prior to spending. The “What’s the Future of Sales?” report looked at how today’s B2B professionals are handling the risks associated with making purchases.

About 52 percent of respondents said that the biggest risk of getting a purchase wrong is wasting company money. Nearly 23 percent of them said that losing internal credibility is their top concern. When researching products in an effort to overcome these risks, the data shows that approximately 35 percent refer to social media and blogs. ... Read the full post

February 24, 2015:A new study from the Leapfrog Marketing Institute, part of Leapfrog Online, found that 81 percent of marketing executives are shifting their budgets to become more customer-focused (vs. channel or product-focused).

According to the data, 52 percent of the participants claimed that they will achieve this change in budget allocation by “focusing on ‘Consumer Life Stages:’ (acquisition, retention, loyalty, CRM, etc).”

Leapfrog’s study, titled “2015 Planning Report Evolving Strategic and Financial Plans for the Always-On Consumer,” was comprised of respondents mainly in marketing, who were responsible for, or were influencers of budget decisions for their company. ... Read the full post

February 23, 2015: According to a report released by FreemanXP and the Event Marketing Institute, viral impact is valued by the majority of today’s B2B event marketers, but only a small amount believe their viral marketing efforts are effective.

Looking at the data more closely, viral impact is at least somewhat important to 65 percent of respondents, however, only 13 percent of them said that they are experiencing success.

February 20, 2015:A new report published by Act-On Software shows that more of today’s mid-sized B2B companies have management objectives tied to acquisition revenue than customer retention.

According to the data, 82 percent of respondents have management objectives tied to acquisition revenue. This is compared to 48 percent who said that they have more objectives invested in customer retention.

“Marketing teams have traditionally focused their time and money on customer acquisition – but that focus is rapidly shifting,” wrote the authors of the report. “Marketers in top performing companies are becoming the new managers of the customer relationship – from customer acquisition, to the more lucrative customer retention and expansion.” ... Read the full post

February 18, 2015: The results from the “Marketing Automation Strategy Survey,” published by Ascend2, show that 65 percent of marketers believe that marketing automation is “very important” to the overall success of their campaigns, however, a lack of in-house expertise looms as their most challenging obstacle to overcome.

When looking at ways to create successful marketing automation strategies, approximately 67 percent of respondents claim that using both outside and in-house resources is beneficial. About 9 percent of marketers said that outsourcing the planning process to a specialist entirely is the most efficient method. ... Read the full post

February 17, 2015: Starting a new business can be a difficult endeavor, no matter the industry or circumstances. The Alternative Board (TAB) recently polled hundreds of entrepreneurs who started a new business to learn what they would have done differently, if they had the chance to do it all over again.

There were a few common areas that most participants wish they had spent more time, resources, and money on: Strategic Planning, Sales, and Marketing. 27% of owners wish they would have spent more time on strategic planning, with 20% and 18% also mentioning sales and marketing, respectively. Along those same lines, 15% wish they had spent more money on strategic planning, versus 18% and 17% for marketing and sales. ... Read the full post

February 16, 2015: A new study on the viral impact of event marketing from FreemanXP and the Event Marketing Institute shows that 50% of those surveyed indicated that they set aside a specific budget for social media. The study also found that a majority (53%) are planning on increasing spending on social media when it comes to event marketing, and the same percentage also measure their viral impact on an event level.

Impact of Different Social Networks

Another aspect of the study was in the identification of the likelihood of viral success, largely dependent on the type of social network used. Study participants reported that Facebook was the most effective pre and post-event, while Twitter was best used in real time, during the event: ... Read the full post

February 11, 2015:The “2015 State of Digital Marketing” report, released by Webmarketing123, recently revealed that B2B marketers are unsure which channels are most effective as they look to generate leads.

Generating leads was listed as B2B marketers’ top priority and they use channels such as email, paid search and social media in order to reach their goals. However, 33 percent of respondents said that they aren’t sure which channel makes the biggest impact on their overall goals and total revenue.

Additionally, B2B marketers appear to be having issues proving ROI. Approximately 24 percent of respondents said that this is currently their top digital marketing challenge. ... Read the full post

February 10, 2015: According to a new Economist/Marketo study, more than 80 percent of today’s CMOs say they need to restructure marketing to better support the business.

As part of this process, the survey results show that marketing’s role in steering the customer experience and driving brand engagement is going to need to continue to evolve in the next 3 years to make it a successful revenue driver. ... Read the full post